The concept, being developed by Microsoft’s PowerToys team, is known as the Command Palette Dock. It would be an optional user interface element designed to provide quick access to tools, system resource monitoring, and other functions, News.Az reports, citing The Verge.
Microsoft has shared early concept images and is actively seeking user feedback on whether Windows users would find such a feature useful. “The dock is designed to be highly configurable,” said Niels Laute, a senior product manager at Microsoft. According to Laute, the dock could be positioned on the top, left, right, or bottom edge of the screen, with extensions pinned to three customizable areas: start, center, and end.
If developed further, the dock would offer extensive customization options, including changes to background, styling, and overall theme. Users would also be able to freely reorder and move extensions between different dock regions.
The proposed dock is intended to complement Microsoft’s existing Command Palette launcher, introduced last year, which allows users to quickly access commands, applications, and development tools in a manner similar to macOS’s Spotlight feature.
Microsoft is currently gathering feedback on the proposal, and developers interested in testing an early version can do so by importing the project from the PowerToys repository on GitHub into Visual Studio.
